Power outage history
Fairfield County South Carolina
8.3hours
without power for the average customer in a typical year, 2018–2025
22nd most of 46 in South Carolina 1.3× the national median
Every day since 2015
Eleven years, one night at a time
Each cell is a day. The brighter it is, the larger the share of Fairfield's customers who were without power at that day's worst moment.
Year by year
Hours in the dark, per customer
2024 was the worst well-recorded year, at 32 hours for the average customer. Hatched years have a thin record and are left out of the averages.
Fairfield, hours without power per customer
The record
The biggest outages since 2015
Ranked by customer-hours lost: customers out multiplied by how long they stayed out. Times are local.
| Began | Storm | Peak out | Share | Lasted | 90% restored | Customer-hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sep 27, 2024 | Hurricane Helene | 7,510 | 54% | 6.9 d | 5.0 d | 381k |
| Dec 31, 2019 | No storm report | 624 | 4% | 7.0 d | – | 52k |
| Jan 16, 2022 | Ice storm | 2,650 | 19% | 36 h | 33 h | 48k |
| Apr 15, 2018 | Thunderstorms | 2,717 | 19% | 26 h | 24 h | 32k |
| Feb 17, 2015 | Ice storm | 2,714 | 19% | 16 h | 7.5 h | 18k |
| Jun 7, 2025 | Thunderstorms | 2,077 | 15% | 20 h | 14 h | 16k |
| Jun 25, 2025 | Thunderstorms | 2,423 | 17% | 13 h | 9.8 h | 16k |
| Sep 11, 2017 | Windstorm | 2,083 | 15% | 24 h | 3.2 h | 13k |
| May 9, 2024 | Thunderstorms | 2,442 | 17% | 9.5 h | 5.2 h | 11k |
| Sep 12, 2023 | No storm report | 1,841 | 13% | 9.2 h | 8.5 h | 10.0k |
| Dec 29, 2024 | Tornadoes | 1,598 | 11% | 9.2 h | 8.0 h | 10.0k |
| Apr 13, 2020 | Thunderstorms | 1,202 | 9% | 31 h | 31 h | 9.9k |
| Aug 7, 2023 | Thunderstorms | 2,817 | 20% | 9.8 h | 6.2 h | 9.3k |
| Jul 25, 2021 | No storm report | 2,563 | 18% | 5.0 h | 1.5 h | 9.2k |
| Oct 11, 2018 | Hurricane Michael | 1,657 | 12% | 11 h | 4.8 h | 8.6k |
| Feb 24, 2016 | No storm report | 1,715 | 12% | 11 h | 6.0 h | 8.5k |
| Dec 23, 2022 | Windstorm | 2,211 | 16% | 9.2 h | 5.0 h | 8.5k |
| Jul 26, 2021 | No storm report | 2,013 | 14% | 4.2 h | 10 h | 7.0k |
| Jun 14, 2017 | No storm report | 578 | 4% | 13 h | – | 6.4k |
| Apr 26, 2019 | No storm report | 1,526 | 11% | 6.0 h | 4.8 h | 5.8k |
| May 6, 2022 | Thunderstorms | 1,123 | 8% | 13 h | 12 h | 5.6k |
| Oct 4, 2019 | No storm report | 699 | 5% | 7.8 h | – | 5.2k |
| May 21, 2016 | No storm report | 680 | 5% | 7.2 h | – | 4.9k |
| Sep 30, 2022 | Hurricane Ian | 1,144 | 8% | 7.2 h | 5.2 h | 4.8k |
| Jan 3, 2022 | Windstorm | 1,101 | 8% | 12 h | 9.2 h | 4.6k |
| Feb 19, 2015 | No storm report | 663 | 5% | 11 h | – | 4.4k |
| Feb 7, 2020 | No storm report | 649 | 5% | 12 h | – | 4.2k |
| Apr 11, 2024 | Windstorm | 2,042 | 15% | 3.8 h | 3.0 h | 4.2k |
| Jun 25, 2018 | Thunderstorms | 700 | 5% | 12 h | 12 h | 4.1k |
| Jul 5, 2025 | Tropical Storm Chantal | 942 | 7% | 4.5 h | 4.5 h | 4.0k |
After the peak
How fast the lights come back
Each line is one major outage, from its peak. The amber line is the typical path.
When it happens
The outage clock
Customer-hours out by month (rings, January innermost) and local hour, 2018–2025.
What was happening
Weather behind the outages
Each outage is matched to NOAA storm reports for Fairfield from twelve hours before it began to its peak. Matching shows coincidence, not proof of cause.
- Tropical storm 48%
- No storm on record 26%
- Thunderstorms 17%
- Ice storm 5.7%
- Windstorm 2.1%
- Tornadoes 1.2%
Who keeps the lights on
Utilities serving Fairfield
As each utility reports to the Energy Information Administration for its whole South Carolina territory, not this county alone. Outage minutes include major storm days.
| Utility | Type | Outage min / yr | Excl. major storms | Outages / yr | Residential ¢/kWh | Customers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dominion Energy South Carolina, Inc | Investor Owned | 131 | 81 | 1.34 | 16.4 | 713k |
| Duke Energy Carolinas, LLC | Investor Owned | 220 | 141 | 1.26 | 13.5 | 582k |
| Fairfield Electric Coop, Inc | Cooperative | 139 | 131 | 1.50 | 15.6 | 33k |
| Town of Winnsboro | SC | – | – | – | – | 29k |
| Newberry Electric Coop, Inc | Cooperative | 512 | 230 | 3.23 | 17.1 | 13k |
EIA Form 861, latest year each utility reported. Outage minutes are SAIDI, the yearly minutes the average customer goes without power; outages a year are SAIFI.
About these numbers
Notes
Outages come from the EAGLE-I record of utility outage maps collected every 15 minutes by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Hours without power are customer-hours divided by the county's 13,983 electricity customers. Averages use well-covered years from 2018. Outages shorter than 15 minutes, and utilities that publish no outage map, are not in the record, so these figures understate the total. How every number is made →